Fistula: Sharing the Knowledge

Voice 2:And I’m Mike Procter. Spotlight uses a special English method of broadcasting. It is easier for people to understand, no matter where in the world they live.

Voice 1:Today’s Spotlight is on the power of shared knowledge. We hear about a project that helps common people to tell their stories. It is giving a voice to stories that no one usually hears. Yet sometimes these stories contain important truth. They may contain information that could help other people. We will tell of how a group of women shared their stories. Their experience told other women how to get rid of an unpleasant health condition.

Voice 2:CDS is an organisation that collects people’s stories. CDS stands for the Centre for Digital Storytelling. The ‘digital’ part means that CDS stores the stories on computers. It then makes the stories available to everyone.

Voice 1:One of CDS’s projects is called Silence Speaks. There are some subjects that people do not like to talk about. One example is women’s health problems. So people remain silent. But ‘Silence Speaks’ helps them to speak about such problems. For example, Silence Speaks worked with two health groups in Uganda - The Acquire project and St. Joseph’s hospital. Together, they helped a group of women who have suffered with a medical condition called obstetric fistula. The women learned how to create stories on the computer! We will hear one of their stories later in the programme. But first, here is some information about obstetric fistula:

Voice 2:Obstetric fistula is a medical condition that can affect women after giving birth. The condition can be prevented or cured. Yet it often affects women in situations where health care is lacking. A fistula is a hole. An obstetric fistula is a hole that lets body waste leak into the vagina, her birth passage. A woman may develop an obstetric fistula when her body is too small to give birth without help. She can be in labour for many days. And this puts great pressure on her small body. In such cases, without medical care, both the mother and the baby could die. If the mother survives, she may well develop a fistula. The fistula causes body fluids to leak from the woman’s body. She does not have time to get to a toilet. The fluids leak without her control. This causes the woman to smell. Fistulas cause much shame to women. And in many cases, husbands reject their wives.

Voice 1:One of the main causes of fistula is when girls give birth at a young age. Betty Naluyima Walakira works for the Acquire health project in Uganda. She told about a health study:

Voice 3:‘The study said that girls have to marry around the age of sixteen and a half. Most girls of that age are not fully developed to give birth. And many of these girls live in country areas.’

Voice 2:The World Health Organisation explained another related cause of fistula. There is often a need to ease the baby out of the mother’s body. So, unskilled birth attendants sometimes cut the mother before or during labour. They use sharp instruments such as knives or broken glass. This damages the woman. In parts of Africa around fifteen percent of fistulas are caused this way.

Voice 1:Many women live with fistula for the rest of their lives. They live in shame, trying to hide their condition. They do not know that there is a cure for it! But treatment can fix the hole and to give the woman a normal and full life again.